My friend Kerry is a recent graduate of the University of British Columbia. He had planned to travel a bit this summer before embarking on his career, but family issues caused him to change those plans. He called me the other day and asked to meet.

 

I quickly learned that Kerry was bored. Goodness, what a convenient problem to have just as I figure it's time to start researching the options for how to publish this book to be!

Over the next week or so, Kerry is going to look into it. By about the time the sticky buns were devoured, we had come up with the following options:

• publish as an eBook
• self publish
• find a publisher

The next step, which we will discuss in a week or so, is to determine what is involved with each option. Ahhhh... where the rubber meets the road!

Yikes. I've been receiving a lot of concerned calls lately. "Have you died, Jackson?"

No. All's well. My sincerest apologies. I didn't think anyone actually read my museings and rants, so this blog has not been getting my attention.

Since my last post, I have been working very intensively on completing and cleanly wrapping up a Sales Jumpstart program for a business association. I've also been busy ramping up another for a vendor of municipal infrastructure services. There's more... but today I will assess the project for the association.

Goodness, if only there were a formula that we could apply that would answer this question!
I've been trying to track down statistics on this for some time. When doing research on the Internet, I keep running across the following:

According to the National Sales Executive Association

Most people don't buy things for their businesses on impulse. A bad buying decision can be career-limiting.

Given that a B2B sale takes time and often includes multiple decision-makers, I find that good second step in the sales process is an viral email "advertorial". This short, informative note gets right to the point of the value proposition, provides relevant links for more information, provides permission to forward and provides my complete contact information.

I'll get to some examples of what I mean by a viral email advertorial another day because the focus of this post is simply identifying the correct email address to send the message to.

Four days ago, I hired Vhanessa.

On our first day we did a lot of housekeeping things.  Like picking a name, for example.  (Most agents have a "stage name" they use for work.)  Or taking a geography lessons.  (I wanted Vhanessa to learn about the geography of where she was selling into, and I was curious to get a geography lesson on her area of the Philippines.)  We also went over scripts in infinite detail and role playing for what seemed like hours at a stretch.  We studied the business my client is in and reviewed websites she could reference for more information.  I even asked her to listen to Internet radio and watch the live news over the Internet so she'd get a feel for the events that the people she would be speaking to might want to chat about.

The last six weeks have been a learning experience.  Learning experiences are great for books and blogs.... bad for sleep and usually involve a lot of the unexpected, which can also cause indigestion.

Fast forward on my last post.  I recently opted to work with a North American business that provides offshore call center agents.  I chose the agency not so much based on a thorough investigation, but on trust. 

You see, I love to be sold.  One day, I received a cold call from a very articulate, very professional person by the name of Alain offering me contract sales help.  I told him straight up that I already had an agent and a relationship with an agency in India, but that I had grand visions of writing a book and would likely need several agents in the future.  I invited him to sell me on the idea of working with him.

Last year, my buddy Steve and I were having a chat in the chairlift at Whistler about business development.  We'd both recently read "The World is Flat" by Thomas Friedman and were curious about how we might leverage some of opportunities that Friedman discussed.  In the time it took us to get to the top of the hill and mostly on a whim, we decided to hire someone in India.

Steve outsources his manufacturing to China and sells his products over the Internet.  I am a consultant who helps a range of growing businesses in the tech sector with their sales.  While our needs were slightly different, our goals were the same:  How could we generate more sales with minimal cost and risk?

It was a great day of skiing! 

We returned home to a pile of neglected work and it was a couple of days before we got back to one another.  OK, now what?  Where do we start?

In my other life, I'm a runner. I've run competitively and I've run for fun.  I've run on a national team.  I've even managed a national team. 

There are a lot of running metaphors that apply to my call center experiences:  Putting your money where your mouth is. Toeing the line.  Putting one foot in front of the next.  Keeping the pace.  Blowing up.  Hitting the wall.

Randy, my most recent call center agent told me he'd been making outbound calls for the better part of 5 years, he routinely made 500-600 calls a day and reached decision-makers 70% of the time.  Hummm... he talks a good story, I thought.  A "rock star" agent!  An Olympian.

My recommendation was that we take a few days for training then Randy pace himself by going out of the gate slowly with a small number of "perfect" calls.  He set his own goal at 40.

As part of a general orientation with Randy, my new call center agent, I clarified what I believe a "perfect" call to be.  Of course, what's perfect to one person might not be perfect to another, but if you want someone to make calls for you, I believe it is only fair that you make your expectations very clear.

Here are the elements of a "perfect" call from my perspective:

• the person who can make the decision is reached
• the decision maker is educated about your product/service and how it will help them
• the opportunity is qualified (Are you speaking to the decision maker?  Is more than one decision maker?  Does the prospect have a need for what you offer?  Do they have the money to buy what you are selling?)
• the status of the opportunity and all relevant contact information is updated in your CRM system

What's a perfect call to you?

I've worked with call centers in Canada, India and the Philippines.  I've only once met face to face with the management of the call center I worked with.  The other night, a friend asked me how I selected the places I work with.  In the end, it all comes down to a bit of due diligence and a lot of trust.  This is a topic that will likey take up a chapter in the book.

Environment

Overlook this at your own peril!  The physical environment has to be conducive to doing business.  Does the place provide an environment that is safe, clean and comfortable for your agent?

Most modern call centers provide soundproof cubicles, but not all.   I've listened to  call recordings of my agents where it sounds like a party is going on in the background.  I've heard stories of huge open rooms where 2 people share a desk and  theft is rampant.  Would you be productive in an environment like that?